Letting Go: It's a Choice

Melanie Lane and her husband, Noah are 32 year olds en route to Mexico as Career Missionaries. They currently live in New Jersey as they await the finalizations of their children’s adoptions. You can find Mel blogging about foster care, drinking coffee that resembles mud, and posting too many stories on Instagram about her kids. Connect with the Lanes at www.loslanes.com.

Letting go.

Let that sink in.

We’ve all let something (or someone) go.

We all need to let something go.

We all have “been there and gotten the t-shirt”.

I am not a seasoned missionary. I am not schooled in the art of letting go. But I’ve been through my fair share of experiences of following Jesus, and this “letting go” thing seems to be par for the course.

Letting go implies that we had something in our possession in the first place. But doesn’t it oftentimes seem that when we have to release something, it more or less feels like it’s being taken from us rather than us giving it over? These are the harder things; the things we white-knuckle to keep in our control until we fall with exhaustion and finally throw up hands surrendered to the One who had it in the first place.

A little over 3 years ago, my husband and I started fostering with the intent to adopt. When we felt the Lord had called us to pursue our next steps - missionaries to Mexico - we were fostering our 3rd child, and were desperately praying he would be “the one” to become part of our forever family.

We applied to become career missionaries and were accepted, all the while fostering this baby boy. As we prepared to head to Missouri for our month of training, our baby went to be with biological family. His departure left a gaping hole in both our hearts, but we knew we had to trust God’s timing and goodness. Little did we know that “letting go” of this baby and our personal dreams of starting a family would lead to 2 more years of coal-walking faith tests.

Fast forward to today. October 10, 2018. I’m typing this while a monitor is quietly humming, watching my 2 babies sleep. One will be officially adopted in a month or so; the other we have been fostering for 2 years (yes, TWO), and are still waiting for the outcome of her permanency with our family.

As we said goodbye to our old jobs (which we let go by our own choice) and our baby boy (who we felt was taken from us), we had to intentionally choose to live life trusting Him and His plans. We had to choose to “trust an unknown future to a known God.” (-Corrie Ten Boom). We had to choose to let go.

We all hold things, how tight will you hold on when God says it’s time to let go?